Tea for Three
by nathy.faithy
Summary: After SHIELD has been through lot of changes, Kara Palamas and Grant Ward are back on the Bus. But is told that the friendships made in battle are the strongest ones. In which Grant, Fitz and Mack have a tea party before joining the girls for a movie night.


I'd like to thank hi-everyone-this-is-anna for the feels, and leaf-onthewind for the idea and the awesome beta-reading.

I hope you all enjoy this fluffiness :)

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_**"Let us be grateful to people who make us happy, they are the charming gardeners who make our souls blossom." - Marcel Proust**_

It's been what Grant Ward likes to call a special kind of hell. Running and hiding with agent Palamas wasn't particularly easy or fun, she still wore May's face after all.

Today he had to walk through SHIELD quarters and deal with his past, while Kara dealt with hers. They walked side by side, quietly. During the last ten months they had built a friendship and familiarity to each other's behaviors (when Ward suddenly stopped as a yell came from inside the Bus so did Kara) before they could figure out what was happening agents Mack and Skye were running past them, without much of a thought they followed right behind.

"Fitz!" Came Skye's strangled voice.

"Yo' man, are you alright?" asked Mack, a gun in his hand. Ward and Kara happened to see Skye roll her eyes and shake her head a bit at his behavior.

"I saw that-" grumbled Mack as Skye arched an eyebrow at him in defiance, her whole face saying, _'I can create earthquakes and you are holding a gun inside the bus?'_. He sighed.

"I'm okay, seriously. Where did this come from?" questioned Fitz as he came out of his bunk holding - more like embracing - a giant caramel monkey.

"That's so cute and huge." Skye declared, smiling in amazement.

"I'm calling it Henry, and I do not share." Mack twisted his lips in a grin trying hard not to laugh at their tiny engineer. Fitz was absurd sometimes, Mack glanced at Skye who had made a pout and unmade it so fast an untrained person wouldn't have caught it.

"As if I wanted to share a stuffed monkey." Skye said, shrugging her shoulders. It was not as if she was jealous off a stuffed monkey, _okay_, maybe a bit. Who would have given him such a gift?

"Fitz, are you okay?" Called Jemma coming from the lab, and to her surprise Ward and Palamas were right in front of her.

"Yeah, no problem!" Fitz smiled at her waving with the monkey's paw, at the same time his eyes caught the other two agents.

"You're in early." Fitz affirmed, passing Henry to Mack's arms in a rush.

"We're sorry. We heard a noise and-" started agent Palamas, "Our bodies work faster than our minds, so we reacted." finished Ward as he kindly gave them a small smile.

"Wonderful!" said Fitz clapping excitedly. "Agent Palamas-" begun Simmons.

"Kara." Skye corrected gently, making Kara tilt her head a bit and present her with a lopsided smile.

"Well. Kara, could you follow Simmons to the lab-"

"Skye too, we need your blood." said Simmons lightly.

"Again?" Skye sounded aggravated.

"Can Ward come? I would feel better if a familiar face was there." asked Kara shyly.

"I don't see why not." Fitz answered, catching up with Simmons as she descended the stairs.

Skye watched as Ward walked calmly by Kara's side, she felt a lump in her throat and breathed deeply, feeling her hands tremble lightly.

"Come on agent Johnson. It can't be that bad." Mack told her, bumping on her shoulder as he bounced the monkey a bit, which made her snort at him. Skye did not see Ward turn and share a look with Mack who winked at the younger man.

When Skye arrived with Mack at her toes, Palamas was laying on one of the tables. Fitz and Simmons talked in hushed tones, which of course was driving the agent up to her walls.

"It's actually quite simple, Kara. I just need you to be really still so we don't accidentally poke you where we shouldn't."

"How is that suppose to calm her at all, Simmons?" asked a bemused Skye.

"I got it." Kara said in a small voice.

Skye crossed over and without saying a word got Kara's hands in to hers and squeezed it gently.

"I'm looking forward to actually meet you." Kara glanced at her and noticed in that glimpse, Ward's words about his rookie. _'You need to meet her. Not the frightened and shattered woman that shot me, but the vibrant Skye I once knew. She shines so bright you think you can touch the sky.'_

"I understand know." Kara murmured, Skye laughed softly before saying, "Funny, I do to."

Meanwhile Mack was standing close to the door, Ward by his side, the two men talking in quiet tones. "Thank you for keeping an eye on them."

"You mean the tiny lab rats or miss alien over there?" asked Mack cheerfully.

"Both, I guess. You did a pretty good job with Fitz."

"To be honest, he took care of me more than I did him."

"Yeah, he has a tendency to do that-" started Grant, as Mack cut him adding, "Skye too."

"I mean, it was hard for her discovering everything she is and what she can do. It was horrible when Trip kind of died on us too. She had terrible nightmares, Fitz was usually there to hug her through it."

"Trip kind of died?" Grant rose his voice a bit, astonished.

"Oh, no one told you? The man is like a phoenix. You know-"

"Reborn from the ashes?"

"Yep."

"Hmm." hummed Grant, the idea toying in his mind.

"So what do you think?" Palamas question echoed through the lab getting their attention. She was now sitting, looking at FitzSimmons and Skye.

"You're very pretty."

"Fitz!"

"What? It's not like I'm lying to her or something, it's simply a statement. Simmons is beautiful too."

"Getting awkward there, monkey man." Skye teased then said, "He has a point though, much less scaring than disfigured May."

Palamas laughed, her whole face brightening up.

"Awesome! This deserves a party, free tea on me!" said Fitz as he put the mask far away from the three women.

"A tea party? Should I go look for my princess tiara and my tutu?" asked Skye playfully at him.

"Who said you were invited?"

Grant snorted softly as Mack shook his shoulders in a quiet laughter.

"Fine. Me and the ladies can have a party of our own. Just don't come crying to us when yours go kaboom!" informed Simmons as she turned from her work and arched an eyebrow at Skye and Kara.

"Yeah, sure. Hmm, right behind you?" Skye was suddenly confused, was Simmons fighting with Fitz again? She thought they were back to being psychically linked, but maybe she had been reading too much into it, Trip said she often did that.

Skye gave Simmons a lopsided smile and glanced at the boys. Mack, Grant and Fitz sure made a funny group, but they seemed fine around each other. Sometimes Skye pondered over all the bridges and mistakes they all had made to be here, at this particular moment helping a fellow agent. Too much contemplation always made her feel weirdly morbid and lately she preferred to ignore that bigger part of hers. They were fine, they had fallen and got up again, rules had been unmade, alliances remade. It had been a long year, too long.

"Agent Skye?" called Kara tenderly.

"Yeah?"

"You coming?"

"Right behind you." Skye answered as she walked past through the boys.

After ten minutes Fitz checked outside and breathed in relief. "The coast is clear. Gosh I thought they would never leave!"

"Someone else is going to join us?" Mack asked sitting on one of the many stools of the lab. The table had been cleaned with Ward's help.

"Lance and Trip might show, not sure." answered Fitz as he extended a towel over the table. Ward opened the cabinet Fitz had pointed to with his hand and picked up a box of cookies and three tea-cups. Fitz boiled the water while he babbled about Simmons who seemed to be even more on edge over gosh knows what, he bet she was worried about Skye again. Mack used the time Fitz was busy eating his chocolate cookie to brag over the fact that after so many attempts on asking Director Coulson to fix Lola, he was finally endorsed. Ward smiled at his triumph, sipping his tea.

Ward discovered Fitz's taste in tea was much stronger than Simmons and he asked for a bit of milk, which the Scottish happily provided, telling the two friends how his grandmother - bless her heart - had taught him at merely six years old how to properly prepare a true Scottish tea.

Lance barged in, complaining that the girls had stolen his so called wife. "Can you believe it? Your grandmother gives you her best pearls and says _'Dear lad, once you find the one and only, I want you to give her this as a gift.'_ You know what I got from Bobbi? A shrug. I never told my grandma this, of course. Imagine what I would tell the old lady?"

"It's good to see you too, Lance." Ward said joyfully.

"Hey Ward, how about your grandmother? Did she gave you gifts for the one and only too?"

"Gramzy was a woman of words, but she did gave me her family engagement ring. My great-grandparents were Irish, so she had an old Claddagh ring. I kept it because I enjoy the legend behind it."

"Oh yes, it's very cute. I've learned in Buffy."

"What the heck is Buffy?"

By now Mack bet the girls were in full movie night mode, so the question was not just absurd as it was simply perfect.

"Oh no. That's it, we need to educate you, you nerd." Fitz was mock-serious at him.

"O-kay."

"Leave it all there, let's find the girls." Fitz imposed flippantly.

"Fitz, I don't think-" started Grant uncertain of a change in the chain of events.

"They won't mind. Get your butt up." said Fitz encouragingly.

Grant had to admit it was good to be back. The engineer's reception was certainly something he was more than grateful for, he shared a look with Mack that winked at him and without more words the three men followed the young engineer. When they arrived in the lounge room, Simmons and Bobbi were debating over which movie they were going to watch this time. Ward spot Skye and Kara with big bowls of popcorn, and impressively or not Trip was taking some of the drinks over to the table.

"Do you mind if we join?"

"What, the tea party wasn't festive enough?" Ward was surprised by the scornful tone that came from Kara, but the smile on her lips answered all of his doubts. The small time she had spent with Skye had been enough for her to approve of Ward's feelings for the hacker/alien, whatever she was.

"This idiot here dared to ask me what Buffy was." Fitz said, closing his eyes and shaking his head disappointingly.

Skye laughed warmly and everyone seemed to stop a second to listen to it, before joining her.

"Let's educate you robot, you need to fall in love with the protagonist, and then -" Skye began babbling, "Oh and cry over the crossed over lovers, love the librarian..." added Kara.

"Oh and enjoy women power, because this show is all about it, well mostly." Trip smiled as he jumped on the sofa.

"So Buffy it is!" Simmons picked the bowl from Skye as she so rapidly put on Netflix and selected '_Buffy The Vampire Slayer'_ pilot '_Welcome to the Hellmouth_'.

Fitz sat down, Mack by his side, while Simmons literally laid her body over his. Kara found a place next to Trip on the sofa, Lance and Bobbi were sharing the love-seat and Skye sat on the floor, joining Ward who looked at the screen a bit doubtfully. They explained some trivia while they watched the show, around episode six half of the team was asleep and Skye had rested her head over Ward's broad shoulder, when episode seven started Skye had joined the team and was sleeping as well. Ward kept watching, he had to admit it was interesting, a bit funny too and once again he was happy for the friends he had.

Fitz mumbled in his sleep, clearly dreaming, _"No Skye, I won't share Henry with you. And no you can't have Ward all to yourself, we are playing 'Clue' now._"

Ward smiled at Fitz sleep-talking cuteness, and feeling tired he closed his eyes languidly, letting Skye's breathing rhythm lull him to sleep.


End file.
